Fellow and Tutor in Politics

Stephen Fisher

  • I am Professor of Political Sociology in the Department of Sociology.

  • I teach the first-year undergraduate Introduction to the Practice of Politics course and political sociology at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

  • My research is on elections, voting behaviour and public opinion, primarily in Britain but also cross-nationally. My recent research has included the politics of Brexit, public opinion on climate change, and ethnic differences in political attitudes and behaviour.

Steve Fisher

Teaching

For the undergraduate degrees of Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) and History and Politics (HP), I teach the first-year Introduction to the Practice of Politics and the second/third-year Political Sociology course. One of my responsibilities is to ensure that politics students at Trinity College are taught by expert tutors for whatever topics in politics they choose to study.

At the postgraduate level, I teach a Master’s course in Political Sociology and supervise doctoral students working on various areas of political sociology.

Research

My research focuses on political attitudes and behaviour, especially on elections and voting in Britain and elsewhere. My recent research has included the politics of Brexit, public opinion on climate change, and ethnic differences in political attitudes and behaviour. I am also interested in methodological issues for the design and analysis of surveys and opinion polls, and in election and referendum forecasting.

The most well-known aspect of my work has been for the BBC where I have been part of the team producing the exit polls and other election night results analysis and prediction, including for referendums and local and devolved elections, since 1997.

I tweet @StephenDFisher

Brexit Polls

Selected Publications

W. Poortinga, L. Whitmarsh, L. Steg, G. Böhm, S. Fisher, ‘Climate change perceptions and their individual-level determinants: A cross-European analysis’, Global Environmental Change 55 (2019), 25-35

S.D. Fisher, A. Renwick, ‘The UK’s referendum on EU membership of June 2016: how expectations of Brexit’s impact affected the outcome’, Acta Politica 53 (4) (2018), 590-611

W. Poortinga, S. Fisher, G. Bohm, L. Steg, L. Whitmarsh, C. Ogunbode, ‘European attitudes to climate change and energy. Topline results from Round 8 of the European Social Survey’, European Social Survey 9 (2018) ERIC

P. Sturgis, J. Kuha, N. Baker, M. Callegaro, S. Fisher, J. Green, W. Jennings, ‘An assessment of the causes of the errors in the 2015 UK general election opinion polls’, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A: Statistics in Society 181 (3) (2017), 757-781

S.D. Fisher, A.F. Heath, D. Sanders, M. Sobolewska, ‘Candidate ethnicity and vote choice in Britain’, British Journal of Political Science (2015) 45 (4), 883-905

A.F. Heath, S.D. Fisher, G. Rosenblatt, D. Sanders, M. Sobolewska The Political Integration of Ethnic Minorities in Britain (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013)

J.L. Marshall and S.D. Fisher ‘Compensation or Constraint? How different dimensions of economic globalization affect government spending and electoral turnout.’ British Journal of Political Science (2014)

S.D. Fisher, ‘Definition and Measurement of Tactical Voting: the role of rational choice’, British Journal of Political Science, (2004) 34, 152-166

Professor Fisher
stephen.fisher@trinity.ox.ac.uk

Political sociology is about how people relate to politics. It is about what people think and feel about politics, and how those things affect whether they participate in politics. This includes whether they turn out to vote, and if so, which way they vote. The drama of elections, together with the changing issues and events in politics, make political sociology an exciting and always pertinent area to study and research.